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Rolf Aurness (February 18, 1952- ) |
 The Largest Surfing EncyclopediaA-Z: A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z Advertisement
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He was the World Surfing Champion in 1970, but the talented goofyfoot son of the hugely popular television actor James Arness (born James Aurness, who played Marshall Matt Dillon on "Gunsmoke" from 1955 to 1975) seemed to vanish from the surf scene shortly after his title victory at Johanna, Australia. Aurness' aggressive backside vertical attack and practical equipment choices made him a true consensus champion at age 18, not only because of his surfing prowess, but because of his personal humility and generally positive, upbeat nature. His disappearance prompted the perennial question, "Whatever happened to Rolf Aurness?"
Born in Santa Monica, California, Aurness was 9 years old and really getting into surfing when he fell out of a tree and severely fractured his skull. His father, who had been an avid surfer since moving to the coast in 1946, was determined that his son would overcome the damage and recover, and he felt that surfing was the way to do it. He commenced a strict training routine, which included daily dawn-patrol sessions at Santa Monica beaches, distance swimming (including underwater laps) and weekend trips to San Onofre, Baja and the Hollister Ranch. These brief getaways were augmented with two or three longer trips to Hawaii each year, where Jim rented a house strategically located on the beach at Makaha. There, Aurness' surfing developed under the mentoring of local lifeguard Buffalo Keaulana and the rest of the West Side crew. Aurness had won his first contest (a boys' division win at the annual San Onofre club competition), and Big Jim entered his son in every contest up and down the coast. The training regimen paid off, and the boy responded by going on a winning tear that had him dominating the Western Surfing Association juniors by 1968, earning him a berth at the World Contest in Puerto Rico that year. In 1969, Rolf dominated the new elite AAAA men's division, kicking off the season with three straight wins (Redondo, Oceanside and Malibu) and assuring himself top slot on the next West Coast World Contest team. He was a conspicuous presence in surf ads for Bing Surfboards and Hang Ten, and he was the subject of interviews and magazine articles. The World Contest was held at Bells Beach, near Torquay in Victoria, but a lingering flat spell drove contest organizers to relocate the final day's competition to a remote beach near the daily-farming community known as Johanna. There, in dwindling daylight, on May 13, 1970, Aurness rode his 6'10" Bing Foil to the World Title, clearly dominating the rest of the pack, most of whom rode shorter boards. A popular champion, Aurness' victory received extensive coverage in the general press, much of it due to the fact that he was "the Marshall's son." Partially in reaction to this reportage, he returned to California to fall under the influence of so-called psychedelic gurus as well as the partying lifestyle of his mother (divorced from his father in 1960) and older sister, Jenny. Having won the championship, Rolf seemed to lose interest in surfing, took up playing improvisational jazz piano for a time, and married an "astrologer to the stars," who died of cancer in 1978. This, combined with the shocking deaths of Jenny (in 1975) and his mother (1976), sent Rolf into seclusion at his father's property at the Hollister Ranch in 1980, where he gradually resumed an active surfing lifestyle and worked on developing high-speed hydroplane surfboards. When The Ranch property was sold in 1986, Aurness returned to the Los Angeles area, where he lives near his father and works part-time in a Santa Monica mental-health clinic as a volunteer counselor. He has been working on prototypes of a new hydroplane surfboard, which he plans to sell under both the Rolf Aurness Hydroplane and Butt Juice Surfboards logos. A practitioner of kriya yoga and meditation, Aurness is alive and well and says that surfing has always been a part of his life.-- Drew Kampion, December 2000
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